POLLUTION SURVEILLANCE AND DATA ACQUISITION USING MULTISPECTRAL REMOTE SENSING1

Large scale water resource investigations and effective pollution surveillance programs require the development of additional instrumentation and techniques to supplement existing methods of data acquisition. As a result, interest is growing in the concept of remote sensing. Described in this paper is the multispectral sensor concept and its application in water resource studies.     

如何做好环境监测实验室质量监督工作

分析环境监测实验室关键质量环节,探讨如何做好质量监督工作。     

中国西部自然保护区与周边社区协调发展的研究

在分析了目前中国西部自然保护区建设和管理的质量问题基础上 ,认为推行社区参与保护区共管是提高保护区管护质量的首选途径 ,并系统阐明社区参与组成共管体系的原则和技术路线以及一些模式化成果。最后 ,指出在实施社区参与共管过程中存在的 3个问题。     

Aerial lift fall injuries: a surveillance and evaluation approach for targeting prevention activities

PROBLEM: Work on aerial lift platforms exposes workers to fall hazards. The objective of this study was to identify the most common injury scenarios and determine current research gaps for addressing fall incidents associated with aerial lifts. METHODS: Three databases were searched: Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI), NIOSH Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (FACE) reports, and OSHA Incident Investigation Records. RESULTS: The majority of falls/collapses/tipovers were within the height-category of 10-29 feet. Tipovers comprised 44-46% of boom-lift falls and 56-59% of scissor-lift falls. Constructing and repairing activities were most commonly associated with fall/collapse/tipover incidents. DISCUSSION: CFOI and OSHA/FACE show convergent data, suggesting similar scenarios for aerial lift tipovers. IMPACT ON INDUSTRY: The analysis provides the aerial lift industry information to prioritize their efforts on aerial lift design.     

Realizing the potential of GIS in community-based management of protected areas

SUMMARY

This paper explores the roles GIS technology can play in support of land management, focusing in particular on its application in protected environments such as Biosphere Reserves. These ecologically significant areas present complex planning situations since, unlike areas set aside solely for conservation, they must continue to support human populations that depend on natural resources for their economic and social well being. In situations such as marginal tropical locations, land managers often face major economic and political disincentives to the conservation of precious natural resources. The necessity for community participation and local expertise in the planning process becomes increasingly critical as GIS evolves from a basic presentation aid for spatial data to a synthesizing problem-solving tool. Coupled with enhanced community participation is the opportunity for greater education of stakeholders; the potential for GIS to serve as a medium for information gathering and dissemination is discussed. A case study in the Sierra de Manantlán Biosphere Reserve (SMBR), México, is presented.     

Catalyzing success in community-based conservation

Efforts to devolve rights and engage Indigenous Peoples and local communities in conservation have increased the demand for evidence of the efficacy of community-based conservation (CBC) and insights into what enables its success. We examined the human well-being and environmental outcomes of a diverse set of 128 CBC projects. Over 80% of CBC projects had some positive human well-being or environmental outcomes, although just 32% achieved positive outcomes for both (i.e., combined success). We coded 57 total national-, community-, and project-level variables and controls from this set, performed random forest classification to identify the variables most important to combined success, and calculated accumulated local effects to describe their individual influence on the probability of achieving it. The best predictors of combined success were 17 variables suggestive of various recommendations and opportunities for conservation practitioners related to national contexts, community characteristics, and the implementation of various strategies and interventions informed by existing CBC frameworks. Specifically, CBC projects had higher probabilities of combined success when they occurred in national contexts supportive of local governance, confronted challenges to collective action, promoted economic diversification, and invested in various capacity-building efforts. Our results provide important insights into how to encourage greater success in CBC.     

Transparency in global sustainability governance: to what effect?

ABSTRACT

Transparency in environmental governance is no longer an uncontroversial answer to problems of accountability and effectiveness. How to design effective transparency systems and in what policy contexts they are effective remain contested issues. This special section, consisting of this introduction and four research articles, interrogates complex and potentially conflicting links between transparency, accountability, empowerment and effectiveness in environmental governance. Building on existing literature and the four contributions, we discuss persisting diversity in varieties of transparency, the evolving dynamics of commodity chain transparency, and the consequences of emerging novel forms of digitalized transparency. As we show, the contributions to this special section interrogate in novel ways the transformative potential of transparency, through shedding light on the performative effects of transparency in ever more complex environmental governance contexts. These contexts may include, inter alia, the growing ubiquity of traceability in transnational commodity chains, the need for ever more anticipatory (ex-ante) forms of environmental governance, and an ever-broadening quest for digitally monitored environments. In particular, the impacts of the real-time ‘radical’ transparency engendered by use of novel digital technologies remain under-analyzed in the sustainability domain. We conclude by raising several critical concerns that deserve further scientific research and policy debate.     

Community based initiatives to mainstream climate change adaptation into disaster risk reduction: evidence from the Hunter Valley (Australia)

In Australia, local communities often enact Community-Based Initiatives (CBIs) to respond to climate change through Climate Change Adaptation (CCA). CBIs can also be integrated into the Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) agenda. The paper explores the extent to which CBIs promote the mainstreaming of CCA into DRR. Primary data were obtained from interviews with representatives of CBIs and supporting organisations in three local governments of the Hunter Valley (New South Wales, Australia). Findings show that CBIs recognise the potential contribution of climate change in modifying the local hazard profile. CBIs mainstream CCA into DRR by following four approaches: environmental and social justice; sustainability and transition; ecosystem-based approach; and adaptive planning. Partnerships were identified both among CBIs and between CBIs and City Councils; however, conflicts between CBIs, City Councils and business actors emerged, and a lack of commitment by multi-level governments in responding to climate change was revealed. The findings show that CBIs consider CCA and DRR within a broad everyday context related to vulnerability and local development. But we argue that assigning responsibility for climate change issues to CBIs is not a panacea and should not be the only local climate change response. Instead, CBIs need to be included in a larger and long-term commitment by actors that possess access to resources, such as higher levels of government. The paper provides a local Australian perspective on the effectiveness of mainstreaming CCA into DRR and furthers the conversation for the benefit of other communities facing similar challenges.     

安全监控系统的防雷技术研究

雷电对安全监控系统的电子设备是非常有害的,所以必须对其进行防御。为了科学系统地设计安全监控系统的防雷方案,本文从电磁兼容的角度对雷击种类及其破坏机理的分析,掌握了雷电的耦合途径及防雷关键所在,从切断电磁耦合途径的思路入手对安全监控系统的防雷技术进行了分析与设计。利用避雷针、避雷器及屏蔽接地等方法对安全监控系统的雷击防护进行了设计,经工程实践证明本文的避雷措施是行之有效的。     

Measurement of machinery safety level in the European market: A real case based on market surveillance data

This article aims to highlight the current status of compliance to Machinery Directive 98/37/EC (transposed to Spanish regulation as RD 56/1995, of 20th January) (a new directive numbered as 2006/42/EC [Directive 2006/42/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 may 2006 on machinery, and amending Directive 95/16/EC (recast). OJ L157/24-86, 9.6.2006.], that recasts and replaced 98/37/ED directive and its amendments, came into force on 29 June 2006; it will not be applied until 29th December 2009. European Member States have a lead-time of two years to adopt and publish the national laws and regulations transposing the provisions of the new Directive into national law. Latest 10th October, Spain transposed Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC to national regulation as Real Decreto 1644/2008 [Real Decreto 1644/2008, de 10 de octubre, por el que se establecen las normas para la comercialización y puesta en servicio de las máquinas. BOE 246/2008, de 11 octubre 2008. Páginas 40995–41030]) of a particular family of machinery (hand-held, medium and small-size, deeply introduced in the market, of low-medium cost), that any user, professional or non-professional, can acquire as first-hand in any of the sales points (whether or not experts in these kind of products).At the same time, it emphasises the most significant shortcomings and non-conformities found, after analyzing the results of five consecutive Campaigns of Control of Industrial Products performed by one of the labs (placed in Spain) involved in the market surveillance European Program.